Our Keepers
by April Snakehole
Summary: Remus and Lily move into a flat together after graduation. UPDATE: I fixed the atrocious formatting. Sorry about that!


A/N Edit: SO intensely sorry for the formatting mess this was before. God willing, this is all fixed.

A/N: Thanks to puttingslothstoshame over on tumblr for the prompt.

Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns Harry Potter.

The flat was small and a bit run down, but it was theirs. A month out of Hogwarts, a month into the war, it was nice to celebrate a simple milestone. Sirius, Peter, and James had been over for some beers but they had left now, and Remus and Lily were sitting on the couch, exhausted but glowing with the thought of being somewhat real adults.

"I feel old," Lily giggled, taking another sip from her beer. She put it on the table and grinned at Remus before grabbing a coaster. He shook his head and chuckled. "What? What kind of an adult leaves rings on a table?"

"The kind Sirius is," he said. He leaned forward and rubbed the still-damp ring left behind by Sirius's drink.

"Well, let's all strive to be better adults than Sirius Black," she said.

It was a nice table. James had dragged Lily and Remus to go furniture shopping. He had convinced them to walk through a higher end shop. "For fun," James had said. Remus and Lily had followed him, pointing at things that were beautiful but too expensive with sighs and shrugs. They'd gone to get ice cream after and James slipped away, back to the shop to buy them all the pretty things they couldn't afford. Lily had pushed his face into his ice cream.

"Do you want me to return it?" James had asked, wiping chocolate ice cream from his nose and licking it off his finger.

Remus and Lily had shared a sharp glance. "No," they had both sighed.

James had reached across the table to wipe a tiny bit of ice cream onto Lily's nose. "I just want you two to be comfortable."

She had glared at him for as long as she could but her face crumbled into a defeated, embarrassed grimace. "I know."

It was scary, being adults. It was scary being in this flat, knowing this was home but knowing that it wasn't yet. Bad thoughts started swirling through her head and Lily grabbed her bottle off of the coaster and tried to recapture the excitement she'd been feeling earlier. She was an adult! But there was a war and her parents were dead and she didn't have much of a choice other than to be one.

A heavy sigh distracted her from her own spiraling thoughts. She looked over to find Remus with his eyes closed, a slightly grim smile on his face.

"What's wrong?"

"You know what this is, right?"

"This is… our flat?"

"Yes. But I mean," Remus motioned towards Lily and then back to himself, "This."

Lily squinted at him in confusion. "Two… mates… being mates? Being flatmates. I'm bad at this game. I don't—"

"James wants us to be the other's keeper."

That hadn't at all been what Lily was expecting to hear. She blinked and let his words sink in. "How's that?"

"He wants you to look after the moody werewolf and me to look after…"

"The mudblood girlfriend?" she offered blithely.

Remus scowled at her. "Lily. That's not—"

"I know, I know." Her smile was grim now, too.

"It's true though. We are each other's babysitters for James."

Silence fell and Lily drew her finger in a circle around the lip of her bottle. It was a nervous habit, but when wasn't she nervous lately. There was a war and she was a target and she had a boyfriend she loved too much. She stopped her hand and put the bottle down back on its coaster. She took a deep breath and made her face look as casual as she could. "So?" She said quietly.

He frowned and shook his head. "So don't you feel a bit… annoyed? He thinks we can't take care of ourselves. He bought us all this furniture. He thinks he can just—"

"Remus, do you not want to live with me? Because you don't have to, honestly. If it's just going to cause you grief—"

"It's not that. It's just," he sighed and raked his hands through his hair. Lily smiled, thinking of where he'd picked up the habit.

"I argued with James for two weeks because I wouldn't move in with him. He didn't understand that I needed to be independent for a bit. I never imagined I'd be thinking about moving in with my boyfriend out of school. Unmarried. Lord, what would my mother say if she were alive?" She shook her head slightly. "I'm getting off track. I'm glad I'm not moved in with James. But I'm glad I'm not moved in alone." She reached over and grabbed his hand. "The world is terrifying right now. I'm glad that you're here. I'm glad I can rely on you a bit. I love you, Moony. I don't mind looking after you. I don't mind you looking after me."

It had been seven years, but Remus still wasn't used to having such friends. With the boys they did a lot of grand gestures and insults to show their love. He could handle that with a bit more dignity than he could this. He blinked hard, trying to keep from crying. It was a losing battle, but he was willing to lose this one. He pulled her forward into a hug so he could at least hide his face.

"I love you, too, Lily," he whispered.

She mopped her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater and then attacked Remus's splotchy face with the same sleeve.

"What a pair we are," she smiled. Her eyes were electric green and rimmed with red. Remus was glad he wasn't the only tearful idiot in the flat.

"I think James overlooked that this flatmate situation would be conducive to a lot of heartfelt conversations and tears," Remus chuckled and rubbed at his eyes.

"Ah, well. I'll keep the fridge stocked with chocolate. Helps me when I get weepy," Lily said. She leaned back into the couch and sighed. "Want to pop out to the store and get us some, keeper?"

Remus smiled. "I'll do you one better. I've got a bar in the freezer right now. Want to split it?"

"Man, I've got the best keeper in the world."

"Mine isn't so bad either."


End file.
